Editor's Note
Editor’s Note: New York City’s beloved newsstands are holding on for dear life
Between a new program converting the stands into delivery worker hubs and the loyalty of customers, this icon of city life is evolving to stick around.
Mohammad Ismail Hussain works at the newsstand at 70th St. and York Avenue on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. Ralph R. Ortega
The New York City newsstand has been dying a slow death. At their peak in 1950, there were more than 1,300 of them. Now there are 330, including 36 that had their licenses extended by executive order during COVID-19. Their renewals are now being processed, a spokesperson for the Department of Consumer and Worker Protection told City & State.
There can be a new life for the newsstand. Mayor Eric Adams announced last week that vacant former newstands would be converted into the nation’s first hubs for delivery workers. Using a $1 million federal grant, the hubs would provide workers shelter, tools to fix their bikes and battery chargers. The stands for this project are operated by the Parks Department. It’s not known yet how many will be converted. Four currently are not operating or licensed, a parks spokesperson said. Three are in Manhattan at City Hall, West 72nd Street and Amsterdam Avenue and West Third Street and Sixth Avenue. The fourth is in Callahan-Kelly Park in Brooklyn.
Meanwhile, newsstands that continue in their original capacity sell only a handful of newspapers and survive mostly on candy, lottery, soda sales and loyalty. “Everybody here is my best customer. I’m trying to give the best service I can,” said Mohammad Ismail Hussain, who runs the stand at 70th Street and York Avenue that has a loyal following that proves the business and similar newsstands are not going away easily. “Not this one,” lab tech Camile Bolden, 55, told City & State as she cashed in a winning lottery ticket at the stand. “This one’s a gold mine.”